Sabic Opens PP Pilot Plant in the Netherlands

Chemical company Sabic has inaugurated a new polypropylene (PP) pilot plant in Geleen, the Netherlands, and also announced plans for new state-of-the-art PP extrusion facility to be built at the same location.

An opening ceremony for the pilot plant and a customer event was presided over by Yousef Al-Benyan, Sabic vice chairman and CEO, and the Dutch Minister of Economic Affairs, Henk Kamp on Sept. 13.

The new PP pilot plant, located at the Sabic’s Global Technology Center for Europe in Geleen, will design next-generation PP materials. It is already on-stream using gas-phase polymerization technology. The plant will enable accelerated development and commercialization of material solutions for the automotive, health- and personal care, appliances and advanced packaging industries.

The new facility will serve to develop grades with improved balance in stiffness and impact resistance, flow properties, and other properties specific to target applications. Sabic plans to concentrate on development of impact grades of polypropylene, as well as random copolymers and homopolymers. It will also carry out experiments on advanced catalysts.

The PP extrusion line is expected to be in operation in the fourth quarter of 2017, and is intended to support the development of next-generation lightweight applications in industries such as packaging, appliances, automotive, and healthcare.